Memory for proper names: A review

Abstract

Proper names have a frustrating propensity to be forgotten. A considerable amount of laboratory and naturalistic data has demonstrated this vulnerability of proper names to memory errors both in learning new names and in retrieving familiar names. Moreover, retrieval of familiar proper names is especially affected in old age and in some cases of aphasia. This pattern of vulnerability offers an important opportunity for gaining insight into basic memory processes and architecture by identifying the characteristics of proper names that disrupt memory.     

Monitoring memory errors: The influence of the veracity of retrieved information on the accuracy of judgements of learning

The current study examined the degree to which predictions of memory performance made immediately or at a delay are sensitive to confidently held memory illusions. Participants studied unrelated pairs of words and made judgements of learning (JOLs) for each item, either immediately or after a delay. Half of the unrelated pairs (deceptive items; e.g., nurse–dollar) had a semantically related competitor (e.g., doctor) that was easily accessible when given a test cue (e.g., nurse–do_ _ _r) and half had no semantically related competitor (control items; e.g., subject–dollar). Following the study phase, participants were administered a cued recall test. Results from Experiment 1 showed that memory performance was less accurate for deceptive compared with control items. In addition, delaying judgement improved the relative accuracy of JOLs for control items but not for deceptive items. Subsequent experiments explored the degree to which the relative accuracy of delayed JOLs for deceptive items improved as a result of a warning to ensure that retrieved memories were accurate (Experiment 2) and corrective feedback regarding the veracity of information retrieved prior to making a JOL (Experiment 3). In all, these data suggest that delayed JOLs may be largely insensitive to memory errors unless participants are provided with feedback regarding memory accuracy.     

Developmental Changes in the Consideration of Sample Diversity in Inductive Reasoning

Determining whether a sample provides a good basis for broader generalizations is a basic challenge of inductive reasoning. Adults apply a diversity-based strategy to this challenge, expecting diverse samples to be a better basis for generalization than homogeneous samples. For example, adults expect that a property shared by two diverse mammals (e.g., a lion and a mouse) is more likely to be shared by all mammals than a property that is shared by two more similar mammals (e.g., a lion and a tiger). Across four studies, we document a developmental progression in children's understanding that diverse samples provide a strong basis for generalizations, such that young children (grade 1) consistently failed to consider sample diversity within their inductive reasoning, but older children (grade 5) preferred to create diverse samples on which to base inferences about basic-level categories. These results suggest that recognizing the value of a diverse sample for inductive reasoning emerges slowly across the elementary school years.     

Three-Year Itch: Communicating Information to Minimize Faculty Anxiety During College and University Presidential Transition

Abstract

Through a mixed methodology study of college and university faculty and presidents’ perceptions as they experience presidential change in Christian higher education, researchers addressed these research questions: Are there factors present that contribute to successful change during administrative transition in Christian higher education? If so, what are these factors? Faculty were surveyed using the Best Christian Workplaces (BCW) instrument. Following analysis of survey results, faculty participated in focus groups to qualitatively respond to the BCW survey. Finally, an interim president and newly elected president were interviewed to assess their perceptions of presidential transitions in Christian higher education. Researchers affirm conclusions from the literature and explain a key finding that contributes to the field of presidential change in Christian higher education.     

Emptiness,Engulfment, and Life Struggle: An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis of Chronic Depression

This article explores participants’ experience of what it is like to suffer depression, endured for years. Four women and three men, who each reported a minimum of four years’ of depression, were interviewed and themes were generated using interpretative phenomenological analysis. A first complex theme is depths of emptiness, which encompasses decline of will, disconnection from others, empty future, and numbing of the self. A second theme, episodic despairing engulfment, describes agonizing feelings and thoughts, a sense and conviction that one’s world and self are being destroyed, a growing belief that there is no escape, and sometimes ideas of suicide. The third theme, the struggle of unending life problems, describes a perceived timeline of struggle and difficulties, and terrible feelings and emotions. Five of the participants engaged in extreme negative thoughts and narrations about themselves, whereas two focused specifically on loss and threatening present situations. We conclude that chronic depression involves the experience of emptiness, but also a repeated experience of the destruction of self, connection to the world, and deepest hopes. In chronic depression there are negative thoughts and feelings, yet crucially, it also involves alterations in motivation, in particular a process in which aims, cares, and concerns that form important parts of the person’s life are repeatedly thwarted or destroyed. In extreme occurrences, the phenomenological self seems to be passing out of existence.     

Race-contingent aftereffects suggest distinct perceptual norms for different race faces

Faces of one's own race and of other races are thought to be located in different regions of face space (Valentine, 1991 Valentine, T. 1991. A unified account of the effects of distinctiveness, inversion, and race in face recognition. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 43A: 161–204. [Taylor & Francis Online] , [Google Scholar]). Here we investigated whether faces of different races (Caucasian and Chinese faces) have dissociable neural coding and distinct norms. We used adaptation techniques to alter perceptions of normality (aftereffects) for faces. Caucasian and Chinese participants adapted to distorted faces of one race (e.g., Chinese contracted faces—Experiment 1), or oppositely distorted faces of both races (e.g., Chinese contracted and Caucasian expanded faces—Experiment 2). We then tested for aftereffects in Chinese and Caucasian test faces. In Experiment 1 aftereffects were reduced when a change in race between the adapt faces and test faces occurred. In Experiment 2 aftereffects occurred in opposite directions for the two races. These results demonstrate that dissociable neural populations code faces of different races and suggest the existence of race-specific face norms.     

Integrating Individual and Organizational Perspectives for Career Development and Change

This article illustrates how traditional concepts of person-environment fit and transition can be adapted to deal with change, and highlights the advantages of an integrated organizational and individual perspective on career development. Using an adapted version of the Minnesota Theory of Work Adjustment and a “Me Incorporated” metaphor, the article illustrates the need for both the individual and an organization to consider immediate and future demand and supply factors in relation to the other. In addition to placing a change overlay on training, selection and career development, the article illustrates how recommendations for dealing with organizational change can be adapted for use by “Me Incorporated”.     

Expanding our research and practice through innovative research methods

In this article, we argue that work and organizational psychology is still dominated by quantitative research studies based on positivist beliefs about the conduct of research. Drawing on Symon and Cassell (1999), we suggest a number of reasons for this continuing situation and outline the ways in which this special issue seeks to overcome some of these “barriers to change”. We draw attention to the contrasting epistemological beliefs that might inform different research projects and which are illustrated in the articles presented here. The collected articles also demonstrate the insights that using qualitative methods can provide on a wide range of (very practical) organizational issues. We conclude by recommending the consideration of alternative approaches and practices to European w/o psychologists.     

Religious beliefs and religious delusions: Response to treatment in schizophrenia

It has been suggested that patients with strong religious beliefs or religious delusions have poor outcome from psychiatric treatment. The aim of the investigation was to establish if the patients’ shorter-term response to psychiatric treatment was affected by these factors. A quasi-experimental design was used, in which patients with schizophrenia were assessed soon after admission to hospital. They were categorised as (1) religious or not religious, (2) experiencing religious delusions or not, using reliable criteria. Patients were given their routine treatment and their symptoms were then re-assessed after four weeks. There was no difference in response to treatment between the religious and non-religious patients. There was no difference between patients who had religious delusions and those who had other types of delusions. Though this study does not settle the debate, it suggests that strong religious beliefs or religious delusions do not adversely affect the patient's response to treatment in the shorter term.